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Comment by yomly | Hacker News Reader

Luck is lumpy.

Weirdly I seem to do quite well in the casino and often have evening where I leave the casino 2-3X ahead of where I started.

My luck at football betting is terrible, I'm even worse at horses.

When you're up it's quite the thrill. You weather the downs as a cost associated with the particular vice.

I enjoy "emotionally hedging" sports events - if I want X to win I bet on Y

Do you play any other things (sports or games)? Do you not ever go for low percentage / high risk actions if only for the pleasure of occasionally see them come good?

Think bicycle kick in football, haymaker in boxing, high stakes play in poker, 1-frame combos in Street Fighter, technically difficult riffs in a musical jam.

I feel your line of questioning locks money and all its uses to rationality. Money can be an instrument for pleasure and for many, risk-seeking is a pleasurable activity.

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Poker and sports betting have a huge difference. It is not 100% certain you will lose long term. Thus can be pleasurable to me. Certain loss simply can't be and that's why I am curious

Fair enough, but gambling can be social and other times it can be a "cheap" thrill

The other thing is that "winnings" feel like a different type of money. If I win at the casino, I cannot wait to spend that new money. Whether it's buying my friends drinks or buying some item that I wouldn't buy with regular money.

It's really fun to spend money that you feel just fell from the sky. If you employ the right strategy you will still come out ahead 40-45% of the time, and those times can be quite memorable and fun.

You will definitely take losses in the long run but if you play well within your means, they won't have any impact on your life.

> It is not 100% certain you will lose long term. Thus can be pleasurable to me.

Is betting your job or an entertainment for you? If you see it as a job, a means to make money, I feel like that's unhealthy.

When I go see a movie, even if the money is "lost", I still enjoy it. You go to the movie for the emotion it makes you feel, just like you bet for the emotion it makes you fell. It's the trill, the chance of seeing big wins.

At the end of the day, casino can be actually quite cheap if you don't bet too high and there's free drinks too usually ;).

the emotion you feel in the movie or buying any product is the product. The emotion you feel in Roulette is not because you find roulette spinning beautiful but because you think you can win money when you can't. I still don't understand

> The emotion you feel in Roulette is not because you find roulette spinning beautiful but because you think you can win money when you can't. I still don't understand

Sure that emotion is simulated, you won't actually win money. The same is true for the emotions you feel during a movie. The fear you may feel in a horror movie isn't real, you aren't in any danger.

In both case though the emotion is really there and that's what you pay for.

That's exactly why loot boxes are essentially gambling even though you get no monetary gains from it. It plays on the sames emotions, the same thrill.

In the movie you are certain that this is not happening. In the roulette your mind actually thinks that you won. When you win $500 in the roulette you think you have won whereas you actually lost money by playing and you are riding some random fluctuations. Few people can intuitively understand the concept that when you win money at the roulette you actually lost $0.2 per spin in a $1 roulette multiplied by the times you spinned.

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